French President Emmanuel Macron went full Orwell this week. While long the darling of Western media, Macron has been one of the most anti-free-speech leaders in the world. This week, he declared that “The so-called American ‘free speech’ today, which some people have promoted, is the opposite of free speech.” Having Emmanuel Macron holding forth on free speech is akin to Joey Chestnut proselytizing on veganism.
France has been in a headlong plunge into censorship and speech criminalization. These laws criminalize speech under vague standards referring to “inciting” or “intimidating” others based on race or religion.
For example, fashion designer John Galliano has been found guilty in a French court on charges of making anti-Semitic comments in a Paris bar.
In another case, the father of French conservative presidential candidate Marine Le Pen was fined because he had called people from the Roma minority “smelly.” A French teenager was charged for criticizing Islam as a “religion of hate.”
Many of us were disgusted recently when Macron celebrated Brigitte Bardot’s life as someone who “embodied a life of freedom.” As discussed on this blog, the French government repeatedly prosecuted Bardot for speaking about her views.
Macron’s praise for Bardot’s “life of freedom” is reminiscent of the reaction of French officials to the massacre of editors at Charlie Hebdo, a satirical magazine. After hounding the victims for years with criminal investigations, the French government organized a march for free speech. As predicted, it then used the killing by Islamic extremists to further crack down on free speech.
In my book The Indispensable Right, I discuss how France has careened down the slippery slope of censorship for decades, and the desire to silence others has now become an insatiable appetite.
Macron has supported figures like his anti-free-speech ally Thierry Breton in globalizing the reach of the infamous Digital Services Act (DSA) to curtail speech, including Americans and American companies.
In his latest pitch for censorship, Macron pulls out an old saw that if everyone can speak freely, no one can speak freely.
Macron declared that “There is no freedom if there is no limit to my freedom, which begins with the freedom of others and respect for a common framework. I know this when I walk down the street: my freedom cannot mean hitting you, insulting you or trashing the public space we all share.”
That line is remarkably telling. It captures how even “insulting” language is treated as a crime in France.
Since then, France has been a leader in the rollback of free speech in the West, with ever-widening laws curtailing free speech. France regularly charges people for political and religious speech, including comedians and those criticizing the police.
Macron’s visceral reaction to free speech is shared by many in the European Union.
I spoke in Berlin at the World Forum, which boasted the slogan, “A New World Order with European Values.” Bill and Hillary Clinton and other Americans cheered on the European efforts.
The Digital Services Act bars speech that is viewed as “disinformation” or “incitement.” When it was passed over the condemnations of many of us in the free speech community, European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager celebrated by declaring that it is “not a slogan anymore — that what is illegal offline should also be seen and dealt with as illegal online. Now it is a real thing. Democracy’s back.”
Despite his unpopularity in France, Macron remains a favorite of the establishment and the media in the United States. I was appalled years ago when he came to Congress to spread his anti-free speech gospel. Macron called for a joint war against “fake news” and declared, “Democracy is about true choices and rational decisions. The corruption of information is an attempt to corrode the very spirit of our democracies.”
Our representatives applauded like seals with little recognition that he was referencing censorship. Macron believes that he should be able to dictate which views are “corrosive” to the spirit of democracy.
The claim that more speech means less speech is an oxymoronic talking point of the anti-free speech movement. As I discussed in my book, there has not been a single censorship system in history that has worked to kill a single idea or movement. Instead, it has given more power to politicians like Macron to silence critics and intimidate opponents.
In the end, the only true solution to bad speech is better speech. The public can sort out their own values and weigh opposing views without the strict guidance of the government. Free speech serves as its own disinfectant.
Ultimately, allowing people not just free inquiry but free expression bends the arch of humanity toward truth. Hate and prejudice are inherently flawed values that tend to collapse when exposed to full, robust debate.
That does not mean that it will eliminate racism, sexism, or other forms of hate. Neither censorship nor free speech can make everyone better people. However, what Macron is peddling is the same tired, dishonest claim that free speech is harmful and the government must control what people see and say in public discourse.
This is a nation that still echoes the cry of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity (“liberté, égalité, fraternité”). However, in today’s France, “liberté” remains a declining value. Individual rights of religion and speech are routinely sacrificed in the name of “equity” and “fraternity.”
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Well what do you expect old Dandy Macron to do when his country is burning and his economy is collapsing as the Unwashed want more Welfare? He needs a distraction and this American Free Speech issue is the perfect shiny object for his rabid protestors. The French are more cooked than the UK.
Dandy? Because he wears a suit and tie and is married to the oldest and ugliest female the world has ever encountered. yeah, definitely a dandy.
The French are more cooked…? Julia Child has something to say about that. Bon appétit !
Prof. Turley seems to want a free society to accept brazen attempts to dupe it for political advantage on the part of professional infowarriors. Going back to the Hunter Biden laptop whopper, recall that it was synthesized by Mike Morrell in collaboration with Joe Biden and Antony Blinken. Recall that it was intended to swing a Presidential election — and it worked. Recall that Morrell had extensive training in PsyOps paid for by us taxpayers — training that was NEVER to be used in domestic politics. Recall that the truth about his involvement spilled out after 10 weeks, just long enough to work its temporary magic.
That 10 week delay getting to the truth exposes a major flaw in Turley’s “good info is the antidote to bad info” (which traces back to Justice Brandeis). Skilled infowarriors are laughing to themselves at the naivite — the cleverly-hatched whopper only needs legs temporarily pending the public decision intending to be nudged. After that, it doesn’t matter if the truth is known.
James Madison would cringe at such a villainous, manipulative conspiracy to obtain “the consent of the governed”. He would look to civil torts law as the deterrent. Macron’s error is using criminal law, which makes the state the exclusive judge of what can be expressed in public. Madison would distribute that power broadly among The People where it belongs in a free democracy — but give it teeth through civil torts.
I maintain that had a Public Frauds lawsuit been filed on the heels of the laptop newsflash and the Biden camp’s devious counter-narrative, with immediate subpoenas and compelled depositions, pro-Biden media would have not have hopped on-board to the deception campaign. I believe the truth at that early time-point would have wounded Biden’s credibility. Consider how history might well have taken a better course.
This is what is at stake in tolerating fraud as protected free speech.
What does all that have to do with French law?
the LEFT hate Western Society
The Left are fascists
The Left want to stop you from voting!
Ungrateful Frogs
Nobody does Fascism like far left ideologues like Macron. They impose their Fascist ideas while the leftwing press acts as cheerleaders.
Western Europe is finished. With leaders like Macron and Starmer they have no future. I wonder which will fall to Islam first?
Starmer is gone, hasn’t been PM since almost 3 months. One can see you’re up-to-date on world politics. Now that islam thing, wanna rethink that a bit?
How is an elected president a fascist in a democratic country? Cause he speaks frog?
Idea: Write a piece on the hundred year history of The National Enquirer and its place in American society as “misinformation.” People do not need overlords curating what they may see, hear, or read. People sorted the infamous “bat boy” out for themselves.
If you think that we don’t have Thought Police here in the United States, try expressing yourself openly on a sensitive topic. Our Thought Police don’t wear uniforms or carry badges. They sit in corporate boardrooms, behind media microphones and hold positions of influence and authority from which they can destroy those who dare to speak too freely. Once they gain the power they seek, the uniforms and badges will follow.
Our Creator endowed us (every human being in the world) with unalienable rights, including freedom of speech. Forces in America think otherwise, and gave us Joe Biden and his Disinformation Governance Board. Forces in Great Britain think otherwise, and incarcerate willy nilly for whatever speech annoys people in power. Forces in France and Macron are the topic of the day, well explained by Professor Turley. But if we try to see the forest instead of the trees, as did our Founding Fathers, we might see what cries out to be seen. We might see the global revolution against the values expressed in our Bill Of Rights. It seeks to replace limited government with Big Brother. In America, we have a choice next month … “the midterms”. We can choose to detach from the global revolution and seek limited government by voting for Republicans. Or we can vote for the values of Macron and Starmer, here and now, in America. It’s our choice.
Turley’s counterargument: it makes strong points about the dangers of censorship, but it doesn’t fully settle the other side of the equation—where society draws reasonable lines when speech becomes threatening, deliberately harmful, or destructive.
You don’t dress like a sissy anymore. Is that “threatening, deliberately harmful, or destructive?”
Our creator? … then this … “every human being in the world” obviously you are willingly oblivious that 6.9 billion people do not share your perspective.
You should run for king of Antarctica or some such desolate and barren geographical appendage.
Anonymous,
You might want to consider the fact that our ”Creator” is the language of our Founding Fathers in our Declaration of Independence … i.e. foundational principle of our United States of America.
Considered and rejected. You did reference “every human being in the world”. The constitution doesn’t apply to them, does it?
Nothing is “free”. Like freedom itself, free speech has a cost, especially if not used responsibly.
I get the gist of today’s column but is was somewhat disjointed and repetitive. The proofreader or AI must of had hiccups. Macron is a classic Frenchman with all their contradictions and half measures. Just like the French Revolution and its Liberty, Equality and Fraternity led to the Guillotine and 20 years of the Napoleonic Wars and simply a new emperor for France. The aspire for much but then all they do is get a new republic where they preach the same platitudes and then you move on to a newer republic.
The Clintons, well what can you say about them that has not already been said multiple times. The also aspired for much and came up very short.
I get the gist of your comment but is was [sic] somewhat disjointed and repetitive. Especially like the guillotine analogy and the Clintons.
Memo to Macron: Tu bête.